You fall into one of three groups: either <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let’s deal with that third group of readers first. I’m sorry for bothering you with such an obscure topic, but apparently a plurality of my readers specifically wanted to see this article instead of something practical like, I don’t know, more break-downs of task resolution procedures for C2020. It is indeed a topic important to my own craft, and I may be the right person to talk about it, but I’m not so sure if you need to read about this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You’re reading a rpg theory article about a rather specialized topic; even if you’ve played roleplaying games for years, it’s possible that the ideas and concerns expressed in this article are things you have never yet considered yourself. “RPG theory” is a form of art theory, an attempt by practitioners of roleplaying to understand, verbalize and model what happens during the activity. Although roleplaying is a pretty young art form, it already has let’s say three or four distinct schools of theory, and a bevy of specialized vocabulary. RPG theory is useful for hardcore hobbyists, but it takes as much study as any other art theory to get any insights, and those insights are generally of a sort only useful for veteran practitioners. Theory is something you move on to when you’ve exhausted the immediate development potential in your everyday play and want to develop your skills and understanding further. If you’re happy with your gaming, I propose that the time for RPG theory is not yet; come back to it when you’ve grown dissatisfied and are seeking solutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My specific RPG theory topic here goes back to the early ’00s; I’ll be restating and commenting upon a few parts of an influential rpg theory scheme called the GNS theory. I doubt that this particular article is of much use for a newcomer to the topic; I’m targeting this at intermediate and advanced students. However, if you’d like to get up to speed, no better way than to read the background material I’ll be commenting on here:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
System Does Matter<\/a> by Ron Edwards, 1999 This Ron Edwards fellow whose work I’ll be commenting on here is Ron Edwards<\/a>, my rpg guru, a powerful game designer and the single most important theorist in the history of rpgs. You could do much worse than studying his work. Ron currently works out of Adept Play<\/a>, a sort of combined blog-forum thing. I haven’t followed his work in real-time recently (I am frankly a bit intimidated by Ron, and don’t want to be a pest), but I have no doubt whatsoever that you’re making a grave mistake by reading my stuff instead of his.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you’re intermediate on the topic, understand what GNS is and haven’t read these actual articles, I suggest doing so. While they represent a snapshot of a developing process of theorycrafting from 20 years ago, they are also less muddled by word-of-mouth “I heard on a forum once” understanding than some other sources might be. Considering this essay on hand here, you might also want to read my own GNS summary<\/a> from the ’00s; it doesn’t necessarily agree point-for-point with Ron’s earlier essays, but it’s useful for understanding where I’m coming from on this GNS stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n To put it succinctly, GNS theory claims that the historically observed Creative Agenda (CA, the socially mediated purpose in why we play) in various instances of roleplaying does not form a coherent, unitary purpose; instead, it is possible to observe three separate Creative Agenda Modes<\/em>, classifications of CA, that all have commonly, spontaneously and authentically risen to dominate actual instances of roleplaying activity over time. It’s not possible to say which one of these is the “real” roleplaying, because they are all demonstrably functional activities that use the substrate, the medium of roleplaying, to achieve their aims. (The modes are named Gamism, Narrativism and Simulationism.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n My experience is, by the way, that GNS theory is inherently confusing and misleading to think about until you have actual first-hand experience of the different GNS modes. It’s very common for people to discuss these matters without first-hand experience, which becomes a problem due to misattribution: you assign the label of “Gamism” or whatever to something that is familiar to you, therefore ignoring the phenomenon originally intended by the term. I recommend actually playing and enjoying different games as a starting point to appreciating what the theory is even trying to say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GNS theory further claims that although the creative agenda expressed in an instance of play is in many ways unique in its particulars, each Creative Agenda can be analyzed as being expressive of one of these CA modes, and that each mode coheres internally and conflicts externally: while two players always enter a game with somewhat differing agendas, those agendas are prone to cohering into functional together-play if they express the same mode, and come into conflict if they don’t. In other words, coherent play requires the group to express only a single GNS mode at a time; implicit disagreements lead to creative conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n GNS theory in its base form provides simple external definitions of what the three GNS modes are like. I say “external” because the theory does not provide insight into the creative psychology, or why” or how somebody would pursue play in a given mode. Here are the simple external descriptions:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gamist<\/strong> play expresses as competition Further detail on the internal nature of the CA modes has certainly been authored (most prominently by Ron in his three mode-specific articles), but the bare GNS theory doesn’t really care about what you’re doing in the specific, or why; it just cares that a Creative Agenda expresses a mode, and that these modes seem to cohere or conflict.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This brings us to the question at hand: among debates and investigations inspired by GNS theory the issue of Simulationism is one of the most prominent. For GNS theorists the bare essentials of the GNS theory aren’t usually that interesting; the much more significant question is understanding the underpinnings of the superficial observation: why does e.g. Simulationism exist at all? Why does it cohere, what does that look like? Why does trying to express a Sim agenda conflict with a Nar agenda? Or Gam?<\/p>\n\n\n\n While Narrativism and Gamism have also caused much discussion about the particular internal nature of their kind of play, Simulationism has been much<\/em> more controversial over the years. The reasons are many, but the one that seems foremost to me is that the Forge community collectively found Simulationism to be a frustrating and foreign playstyle. Truly “strong” Simulationism, of a kind that actually manages to be evidently meaningful to an outside observer, was not commonly reported in the early years either because the community had biased participation or because the language didn’t exist or because powerful Sim play is difficult and rare. Sim play was also, for historical reasons unrelated to the Forge, undergoing a particularly weak and timid stage of development in the ’00s, which caused it to lack advocates. Whatever the reason, a community lacking in powerful Simmy actual play, and powerful modern game designs in the Sim mode, was inspired to question the mode to the extent of doubting its existing at all.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thus, the question of Simulationism in its multi-fractured glory:<\/p>\n\n\n\n And that’s just scratching the surface. If you ask GNS theorists for a definition of Simulationism (aside from “the thing that’s not Nar or Gam”) you tend to get quite a variety of explanations. Even Ron himself, the progenitor of the concept, has at least entertained the idea that the agenda mode of Simulationism is either non-existent or non-important.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So yeah, there’s a long history here. I’ve made something of a pet project about investigating Sim over the last ten or so years, so I might have some idea of what’s going on. Let’s see if I can pull together an intelligible presentation of my experiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ron published a trio of articles on the internal nature of the GNS agenda modes in 2003-04. His analysis of Narrativism in Narrativism: Story Now<\/em> is rightly considered a classic treatment on a complex subject matter, drawing on an extended analogue to Lajos Egri’s theory of dramatic theater to provide a set of technical tools for structuring and talking about narrativist play. Gamism: Step on Up<\/em> is likewise as uncontested as anything, predictive of the OSR movement, and generally demonstrated to hold water by all kinds of actual play investigation over the years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The earlier Simulationism: Right to Dream<\/em> is much less obviously satisfactory; don’t take my word for it, but I get the sense that Ron’s detailed exegesis of mechanical rules systems (System Purism vs High Concept, etc.) is not usually considered a satisfactory answer to what Simulationism is<\/strong>, and, what’s worse, what justification it carries as a human endeavour. Sometimes it seems like Ron himself doesn’t really know, either. It’s no wonder that there’s perennial interest for fixing this part of the theoretical corpus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, I just read said article anew prior to writing this one, and you know, I think it’s pretty close to spot on in many places. I mean, I’ll be rephrasing a lot in the following, and perhaps saying some things that Ron didn’t quite get to originally, but I have no complaints with the basic premise: Ron characterizes Simulationism as “heightening and focusing Exploration as the priority of play”, which, as you’ll come to see, is basically my conclusion on the matter. Ron also analyzes a wide variety of historical rpgs in the article, sharply observing their function; well worth the read.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In fact, let’s get a definition out of the way right away. I think that I understand what Simulationism is<\/strong>, and have personal experiences that back this model, so I might as well tell you now. I’ll justify and describe my understanding in further detail later.<\/p>\n\n\n Ron famously defined the creative nature of Sim as Right to Dream<\/em>, with the core conceit that a group engaging in Simulationist play willfully ignores external concerns like social status, time constraints, the ridiculousness of a fat man pretending to be a lithe elf, all for the love of the Dream. The Dream also “doesn’t have an agenda”, meaning that it’s not Gamist, it’s not Narrativist, and it is what it is on its own terms, existing for its own sake. It’s a very escapist way of phrasing things, I think, and doesn’t quite<\/em> get to the meat of what matters; I don’t think that the “Right” is really under tension, not truly. The true creative question of Sim is whether you can<\/strong> Dream: will this group, here, with these tools, manage an elevated appreciation and understanding? (That’s my replacement motto, if you will: “Elevanted appreciation and understanding”.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think that what Ron has observed from the beginning as functional, powerful Sim play is the thing I’m describing here, but it may be the case that he, thinking on this 20 years ago, didn’t see the potential intellectual ambition that to me, writing about this now, is obvious: for the Ron in that Sim article the Sim play seemed to be relatively aimless, low stakes and short on consequences, engaged in for love rather than desperation. He, then, did not seem to identify that a wargamer passionate about the Napoleonic wars, to pick an obvious example of a Dao, plays a Sim game as he struggles for insight into his material. He may not have quite appreciated that it is possible to study Glorantha, as a scholar, without<\/em> a Narrativist ambition. It certainly has always seemed to me that Ron isn’t really big on “roleplaying as personality vehicle”, play that finds its reward in personal realization unadorned by true Story in the Narrativist sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This was, of course, midway into the Forgite theory development. Ideas would mature. Cornerstone understandings such as the concept of the reward cycle were only barely in existence then. And please remember, I don’t even know what Ron’s current take on this stuff is. This article isn’t about him, it’s about my take on some of his ideas from 20 years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Speaking of the reward cycle, here’s my understanding of how Simulationism functions socially: the creative reward of Simulationism is insight, and the basic reward cycle relates to the way ideas are presented to the table and Explored for the sake of discovery. Ideally your play is efficient in that it enables you to introduce relevant material into play and massage it together with the group, seeking new insights and elevated understanding, such that your curiosity grows over the session of play. At some point you stumble upon worthwhile insight, and that’s your reward. Sometimes it’s a major breakthrough for your own understanding of the “thing”, whatever it is that the Simulationistic game is about; other times it’s slow, minor development, honing and practice. But every time it is about the thing in itself. You are joined together by the curiosity towards the subject matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The theoretical implications are, of course, vast: a Simulationistic game necessarily has substance, which implies heft and effort. Historical analysis may have been too easy about calling Zilchplay Sim for superficial reasons, without checking for the presence of actual creative reward cycles, convinced that “they seem to be satisfied” suffices for proof. “Exploration squared” is sort of a legitimate description, although without really grokking the why<\/em>. Immersion is still a technique, not an agenda mode, albeit one particularly relevant to Simulationism the same way “player makes choices” is a relevant technique for Narrativism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n To put the above in more concrete terms, I’ll describe a few of my own experiences of Sim play from the last decade. This will be succinct, and I encourage you to ask for details if you think that some specific would aid understanding. All are examples of games where I personally felt creatively rewarded in a Simulationistic way, as per above.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Auteuristic horror games are an old affectation for me; I GMed Call of Cthulhu<\/em> in the ’90s, in my youth, and while the game often went nowhere, we had I think two sessions in between the stumbling that were creatively successful: chilling, tense experiences full of mood that everybody were excited about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Skipping forward, in ’07 I got intrigued about again trying my hand on the tiller of a horror story with Dead of Night<\/a>, a modern classic of indie roleplaying. DoN is basically like if CoC was implemented with a horror movie genre emulation rules system; it’s GM’s story all the way, you’re supposed to write your own horror masterpiece and then really pour<\/em> that stuff out in a single-session one-shot that outright disregards<\/strong> all the D&D compromise rpg bullshit like parties and leveling and treasure and whatnot. It’s just the GM, the players, a tense rules system, and the GM’s inner demons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For those familiar with it, DoN has a sort of estranged sibling game out there in the indie land: Dread<\/a> fulfills the same exact premise, does it with equal flair, but has a completely different rules system with its own brilliant ideas. I genuinely don’t know which is better, and it’s pure luck that the game I ended up going on my journey of Sim discovery with is DoN and not Dread. One of my long-term projects is to take my private library of DoN scenarios and run some of them with Dread; the two games are 100% cross-compatible in terms of material, and I’d love to see how differently the experience gets structured while still being a balls-to-the-wall horror one-shot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I was fully conversant with Ron’s theory when I first tried out Dead of Night<\/em>, and I was intentionally attempting to achieve Sim play, which at the time and in the context I construed as a satisfying mastery of the horror story; I would GM, and the players would be entertained by a first-person interactive perspective to a good horror story. The circumstances were far from ideal in that I didn’t even have a story as we sat down to play \u2013 a complete actual play report<\/a> happens to exist for this first part of my Hair franchise of slasher horror episodes (I would run a few “sequels” over the years) \u2013 but it was just one of those times when things flow together in a meaningful way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I would go on to run more Dead of Night, and some Call of Cthulhu, over the years. My concrete realization and understanding about the enjoyment of this kind of horror story gaming is as follows:<\/p>\n\n\n\n The GM brings the story:<\/strong> this is the “it” for the Simulationist play agenda in this type of game. It is not a story in a dramaturgical sense, but rather a visceral emotional notion coupled to concrete horror imagery. In our first DoN scenario, that came so well together despite being improvised on the spot, the visceral emotional notion was a Psycho<\/em>-like image of a ever-youthful homosexual serial killer; the concrete horror imagery was the idea of the long hair on a man, setting him firmly in the counter-culture setting and beyond the reach of the honorable society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The players experience the story:<\/strong> whatever the GM has, that’s what you get. Let’s hope it’s going to be interesting. The roleplaying game exists as a first-person interactive story vehicle, it is an opportunity not dissimilar to a VR headset. It’s not there for you to achieve<\/em> anything per se; your goal in participation is to experience<\/em>, and to that end you make choices and prompt the GM and other players to show you the “it” at the pace, from the angle, and to the extent that you choose. Sometimes this means leaving things deliciously unsaid as you realize that your first-person perspective requires you to escape the scenario before discovering the truth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Success is about emotional elevation:<\/strong> this is how the horror story gaming is Simulationist, specifically. You have some horror stuff like “this serial killer acts like he’s your lover, and he has really pretty hair, but he also has a knife”, but you could have that in any agenda mode. What makes it Sim is the elevated<\/em> emotional appreciation when the storyteller-GM’s beats fall in place and the player’s imagination is in line, producing an immersive experience that helps you appreciate the internal nature of the image hiding in those words. As a GM you’re asked to bring a personally meaningful horror story, and you are rewarded by the excitement of the players; as a player you’re asked to pay attention, focus in the story, and you are rewarded with a scary story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And, to be specific and concrete: by running a horror game like this you the GM also<\/em> gain elevated appreciation for your own story. When you succeed with it, you really get what makes it work. It’s a very rewarding experience that inspires you to work on your storytelling craft more and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This is a much more recent example: we played a 50-session long campaign of 4th edition D&D with the local crew a couple of years ago. I used a bunch of progressive tech in there, and intentionally formulated the game with the ideals of Middle School D&D in mind. It was recognizably 4th edition in mechanical terms, but perhaps not so much in attitudes and emphasis. I did intend to write a pretty exhaustive actual play report on the project at Story Games, but the forums got shut down in the middle, so it was left unfinished. Still, there’s exhaustive technical analysis on what we were doing at SG, available at this writing here<\/a> and here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The “it”, the Simulationistic substance, of this campaign originated in my own love for the YA fantasy classic novel series Chronicles of Prydain<\/em>: the campaign consisted of a painstaking deconstruction and moving-pieces simulation of Prydain and its adventures that I created for the group to run through. I turned all the characters from the books into NPCs, all the events into D&D adventures, and so on, basically just converting pre-existing stuff. The players had a considerable amount of leeway in terms of prioritizing game content, picking what to play through on their way through the Chronicles, but it was ultimately a railroad game (of the hub model, to be specific).<\/p>\n\n\n\n What the players get from the exercise is similar to my horror example in that they get a chance to experience an epic high fantasy story from a first-person perspective, with great leeway for what they want to see and do: the PCs in our game got to meet and interact with cool NPCs, lead armies into battle, save princesses, court princesses, delve into literally incomprehensible magics and much, much more. There were big climaxes along the way and tragic, tearful reversals, all hinging on the dice. (Yeah, I’m tricky enough a GM that I can run a railroad D&D campaign without<\/em> fudging the dice once.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, there was more going on, for unlike the typical horror game, the players here also got to painstakingly develop their own heroic persona for the game, a character with mechanically guaranteed protagonism and plenty of room to grow as a playacting mask and alter ego for the player. The game’s rules focus on character development, and the GM and the campaign structure backed this every step of the way, thrusting the player characters into the spotlight as the actual protagonists of the epic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And, more still: a complex skirmish combat system that the players could learn to utilize for cool, memorable combat effects. This part admittedly didn’t work for everybody, but that’s more on the 4th edition D&D rules being sort of questionable than on the concept itself. (I know many like them, but the only thing 50 sessions of this thing convinced me of was that I can create a better Sim skirmish combat rules set myself.) We can say that the game certainly offered the chance to “get into” the skirmish combat thing, and some players jumped at the opportunity, while others didn’t so much. It was not as powerful as this form of game could be, but it was powerful enough that we can say that it was present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n For me as the GM the creative payoffs were vivid when I got to share some of my favourite childhood stories with the other players, and when I got to play around with the highly ironic differences that the D&D chassis and the inevitable player choices made to the overall flow of the epic. Getting to develop the setting and campaign material “on the margins” was also great, as I needed to stat up all kinds of Pridonic stuff and expand upon the specific nature of various challenges. Perhaps the highlight of the campaign for me was when a player joining us around session #8 wanted to play an elf, and this led me into a campaign-spanning arc of exploring the precise nature of the fae powers in the Pridonic setting, increasing my intuitive understanding of British fae lore to unprecedented heights. I seriously have a book outline lying around about this stuff, Prydain is a more interesting setting than is superficially obvious when you realize a few key things about it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
GNS and Other Matters of Roleplaying Theory<\/a> by Ron Edwards, 2001
Simulationism: The Right to Dream<\/a> by Ron Edwards, 2003<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat is the question<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Narrativist<\/strong> play expresses as story creation
Simulationist<\/strong> play expresses as heightened attention to the fiction<\/p>\n\n\n\nAn internal understanding of Simulationism<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Some real examples of coherent Sim play<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Auteuristic Horror Gaming<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
High Fantasy Adventure Gaming<\/h4>\n\n\n\n